Update on Men's Lacrosse Rules Committee Changes for 2013

The NCAA Men's Lacrosse Rules Committee has reversed a ruling (which had been made at its meeting last month) that would have banned the use of a "motorcycle" grip for face-offs. However, there will be a point of officiating emphasis regarding the violation of touching the opponent's crosse during face-offs. Also retracted was a proposal that would have created an experiment with moving face-off players farther apart in fall practices.

In addition, "the committee extended the allowable area to have shooting strings up to but not touching 4 inches from the top of the crosse. The initial proposal called for a 3 ½-inch limit."

For repeated violations during face-offs, a new rule calls for a penalty to be served by the in-home after three violations in a half by a team, including the wing players.

The biggest change to many is the addition of a shot clock when a stalling warning is given. "The committee did clarify procedures that relate to the calling of team timeouts, however. If the offensive team calls a timeout when the shot clock is engaged, the team will be granted the timeout. If there are more than 10 seconds remaining in the count, the shot clock will be moved to 10 seconds on the restart. If there are fewer than 10 seconds, the count will continue from the point where it was stopped at the timeout. If the defensive team calls timeout, the shot clock will be reset to 30 seconds on the restart."

The proposed rule changes now go for review to the Playing Rules Oversight Panel, which will vote on September 21.